[Social] Getting Sirius

[Will Stanton]

"Yeah, but there's no reason for me to be a dick about it," he said, with a sheepish grin.

"It's not even the wait, per se -- though I will admit, I have my doubts about the timing. It's not having a place where I can go to recover from this sort of thing. I've always had something of a depressive personality; ask anyone. And I ache, and I droop, and I tire. But home, I had coping mechanisms. Here, the only things I've found were a calming ray that it turns out had subliminal messaging effects, a drug which ended up with me locked in a mental institution, and a vampire who needed me for sustenance and bank robberies.

I'm working on it; I'm working on it. Just, y'know. Tread lightly on the depression."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"You're wanting for direction. Something that fulfills you in a world you at least have fewer stakes in than your own."

[Will Stanton]

Will nodded, and then paused, and shook his head.

"I don't...I don't think this world has fewer stakes. I mean, I've been here for...essentially 100% of my life, if you use even the slightest form of rounding. I care about everyone here; I just have fewer...connections."

[Samantha McManus]

"You also take things... rather hard, sometimes."

"The pack isn't trying to push you out either, you know."

[Will Stanton]

Will waved his hand at that.

"The pack is made of wolves, and I'm not. I'm prey, not predator.

That is just one of several key differences to be had there. And I'm glad y'all don't hate me or anything, but...you know that's different."

[Samantha McManus]

"You're only prey if you want to be."

"You're only anything if you want to be."

[Will Stanton]

"That's the point, Sam. I do want to be. It's not...not a negative. But it's oil and water with the Pack, as it were."

[Samantha McManus]

"It's not my place, or anyone's place to force you to be something you don't want to be."

"All I can do is... make room, aye?"

[Will Stanton]

Will nodded, slowly. "Aye. Aye.

Of course, with a polycule, things get exponentially more complicated, because it's not just about not pissing one person off, it's about not pissing off anyone they're connected to.

Ashlie, interpersonal relations and friendships are hard in the meatworld. You're sure you don't want to try to figure out some way back to the land of beeps and boops?"

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Oh not to worry, I have brought the beeps and boops with me into this meat-vessel. Besides, I've pretended to be a human for a long time before I decided to deal with a whole school of hormonal young adults. I shall persevere."

[Will Stanton]

"Then I shall persevere, too, as uncomfortable as people are with their friend being a shoe or a succulent or a statue.

The three Ss, of course. Add in small forward if you need to play ball."

[Samantha McManus]

"She doesn't seem too confident she can beat us. She's calling in a ringer."

[Will Stanton]

"Well, if I'm playing, it's two against one. Unfair at the best of times."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Can I trust you not to play favourites as the ball?"

[Will Stanton]

"Well, no. No you can't.

But then, you're not the one that dumped on me in this conversation then, hrm? 'Favorite' is in the eye of the beholder."

[Samantha McManus]

"I think I can cope with a demon ball."

[Will Stanton]

"Right. Well, go a little easy on the new person," Will explained to Sam. "She's new to having muscles and sinews and whatnot. They're overrated, but hey, girlbots will be girlbots."

Walking to a midpoint between the two, Will bounced up and down his heels for a moment, testing the spring in his knees, stretching his elbows and shoulder blades, and generally limbering up.

Then, with a spring, he did a front flip, bending over to grab his knees as he went. And, by the time he had completed the flip, a regulation-size basketball had taken his place, bouncing hard on the ground once and shooting up into the air.

[Ashlie Minamida]

"How hard can it be to figure them out when any old human does." she says, planting herself underneath the ball and holding up one hand to let it fall into her palm. The trajectory is easy enough to calculate manually, adjusting her arm correctly maybe not so much.

[Samantha McManus]

"Your average human is rubbish at moving about for a good three years."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"Because their brains are busy rewiring themselves into basic coordination. Which is impressive, but also very inefficient." she says as the ball lands in her hand and she swivels to the left, tossing the ball into the floor in a fairly clumsy attempt to dribble.

[Will Stanton]

The ball thudded into the ground, and bounced at an angle Ashlie hadn't quite predicted, bouncing away across the floor in the general direction of the basket Sam was 'defending'.

A lack of coordination, or a lack of obeying physics from the ball? A supercomputer could probably analyze that easily enough, but Ashlie was now a meatbag, so she'd have to settle for being disappointed.

[Samantha McManus]

"I'm just saying, you're ahead of schedule," she says as she chases after the ball, and starts dribbling it.

"Not making the basketball team anytime soon, but ahead of schedule."

[Ashlie Minamida]

"How gracious." Ashlie says with a dry chuckle, kicking off her shoes and moving to block Sam. "But you should know the advantages of a custom designed body."

[Will Stanton]

The ball seemed to stick to Sam's fingers just a fraction of a second longer than it 'should' -- not so much as to make dribbling more difficult or anything; more like it was just that fraction easier to control, the connection between her fingertips and the ball that much more tangible and tactile. Easier to grip, easier to make it do what she wanted as she tried to dribble up court.

[Samantha McManus]

"Oh, so you got to optimize this one for dominating at hoops? Do tell," Sam says, trying to make a fast-break to the headmistress' left.

[Ashlie Minamida]

"No." she says, reacting to Sam's move almost instantaneously. What slows her down is her actual movement not being as fast, but her reaction time is almost unreal as she makes a lunge for the ball.

"But for all the intricacies of nerves, nothing beats the signal speed of metal and fiberoptics."

[Will Stanton]

There's a slight tingle through ASHLIE's fiberoptic fingertips as they brush against the ball -- like the action of completing a circuit, ever so briefly.

Not having fleshy fingers for very long, she would only have to assume that wasn't the normal effect of touching vulcanized rubber.

[Samantha McManus]

Sam's grip is good, and perhaps better than she expected, but she's still not prepared for Ashlie moving that fast and the ball slips out of her grasp.

"Okay, so you're a quick study," she says, backing up to guard her basket.

[Ashlie Minamida]

Electric conduction past (through?) her skin. Maybe she could figure out some kind of induction method of--later, focus for now.

Ashlie plays it off as stalling for time a bit, swiveling in place and holding on to the ball. "Machine-learning and instinctive approximations. The best of both worlds." she smiles before taking two swift steps and lobbing a long-shot up into the air to try and arc it in. As a robot she would have made ten out of ten, a thousand out of a thousand shots. Rote repetition of exact movement. Now, vectors of force, angles and trajectories constantly shift and wobble even when she's holding 'still' and it's much more of a gamble to try and find the movement with the most stable numbers as she shoots...

[Will Stanton]

The ball clanged, hard, off the rim, bouncing away wildly towards the sidelines.

It ricocheted hard off the ground, then bounced off the wall at what can only be described as an improbable angle, and headed back towards Sam.

[Samantha McManus]

"Oh, there's hubris," she chuckles as she snags the ball and starts driving towards Ashlie's hoop.

"You really are getting the hang of humaning."

[Ashlie Minamida]

Ashlie dashes after Sam, trying to cut around her at the last moment to block her taking a clear shot.

"Indeed, just like evolution was built on mistakes and blunders that luck into success eventually. I just need to speed it up the process significantly."

[Will Stanton]

Through the legs... the basketball whispered in the back of Sam's mind.

Through the legs and up...

[Samantha McManus]

Sam gets a spreading smirk, then dribbles the ball between her legs and tries a lay-up from her off-hand.

[Ashlie Minamida]

Ashlie is fast to react, but not coordinated enough to capitalize on it as she tries to twist mid-jump to try and bat the ball away.

[Will Stanton]

Ashlie just got a fingertip on the ball, and maybe that should have been enough to deflect it, but darn it, wouldn't you know, the ball soared up and swished through the hoop, sending off a burst of contented telepathic waves to any budding telepaths that might be in the game.

The ball bounced a couple times, before rolling to a stop at ASHLIE's feet, the cheater.

[Samantha McManus]

"Your ball, aye?"

[Ashlie Minamida]

"No need to get cocky over one score." Ashlie says in a flat tone, though her eyes give away her amusement. She once again moves the ball towards herself with her foot before kicking it up and into her hand. "And you." she tells the ball. "No funny business."

With that she starts dribbling. Slowly at first, but with every bounce she seems to be getting better, faster, only losing control of the ball a couple times but catching it with her other hand to bring it back into what can only be described as an iterative learning loop until the thwack-thwack-thwack of the ball begins blending together and she starts advancing towards Sam's side of the court.

[Will Stanton]

The rapid, almost robot speed of the bouncing blurred any thoughts Will might have been sending Sam, any mental impressions from the ball sort of blurring together into an even, flat mix as Ashlie's iterations produced closer and closer ideal dribbling patterns.

[Samantha McManus]

"If you're learning this fast, I've got to take what I can get, aye?"